Parking only for pilgrims in my neighborhood

[No Elephants]

In Boston's North End/Waterfront neighborhood, is the two bedroom home that Paul Revere shared with his second wife, his widowed mom and his 16 kids. (His first wife died soon after giving birth to their 8th child. Revere hired a woman to help out, the married her and blessed her with eight pregnancies as well, apparently with no fear of being widowed again. Gives a whole new meaning to the term Founding "Father.")

As written by poet Longfellow, also a Massachusetts fellow (because what is now Portland Maine was then part of Massachusetts), Revere rode his horse from said home in this neighborhood through villages and towns, to report that the Redcoats were arriving by sea. Paul knew that they were arriving by sea, not land, because the sexton of the Old North Church signaled him by hanging two lanterns in the church tower, not one, which would have signaled Paul that the redcoats were arriving by land.

Revere awaited the signal from the other side of the Charles River, which Revere had reached via Charlestown, a neighborhood what was soon to see the Battle of Bunker Hill. (Every other year, an actor dressed as Revere rides a horse through the neighborhood the morning of April 20, supposedly returning from his warning ride of April 19. On the off year, he rides through Charlestown instead.)

So, in the neighborhood where Revere lived and I live, stands a statue of Paul Revere, astride his statued horse, facing away from the Old North Church and toward Charlestown, where Paul awaited the signal from the church tower.

http://www.paulreverehouse.org/ride/

For my desk top inspiration in December, I searched online for a pic of the Christmas tree near the local statue of Paul Revere, all lit up at night. (This year's lighting ceremony will happen soon, complete with a visit from the Mayor and Santa. The lighting happens during the day, so that young kids can enjoy it.)

This is one of many trees that gets an official lighting ceremony in Boston in December, but it is not Boston's official tree, which comes from Nova Scotia every year. The official tree is put up on the "common," to which the early city dwellers who owned cows were able to allow cows to graze--yet another early, very successful socialist program!

I haven't found a pic of the tree near Revere's statue lit up at night yet. However, while searching, I did come across this (photographed this year):



I guess the city justifies spending money on frivolous things like this because of the city's many tourists? (The City is very worth visiting, IMO.)

This post originally continued on, but I decided that I would split it into two posts.

[No Elephants]

1. Kicking, so that Parking for Pilgrims Part 1 appears on the web page before Part 2.

[No Elephants]

2. P.S. Paul Revere, nee Revoir, of Boston is not to be confused with Paul Revere Dick of Idaho, who

founded the group Paul Revere and the Raiders and, perhaps ironically, was granted conscientious objector status.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Revere_&_the_Raiders

As the French (like the original Paul Revere's dad) are not famous for saying, the more things change, the more they change.

Not quite as deep as "The more things change, the more they stay the same" but sometimes just as true.

The More Things Change
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


The More Things Change may refer to:

"The More Things Change (Cinderella song)", a song by Cinderella on their 1990 album Heartbreak Station
The More Things Change..., a 1997 album by Machine Head
"The More Things Change", a song by Bon Jovi on their 2010 album Greatest Hits
"The more things change, the more they remain the same" (q:plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose), an aphorism by Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_More_Things_Change


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Baptiste_Alphonse_Karr


P.S. If you don't have ADD, include the absence of ADD from your life in the list of things for which you are very grateful. Freedom from ADD is not as big as having shelter, clothing and food, but neither is ADD a walk in the park. And nothing says that you can't have ADD and be homeless, hungry and wearing smelly hand me downs that you have no place to launder, as well.

[Enthusiast]

3. I'll be right over.

I wish.

Hey, you've got it all wrong about Paul Revere, his ride, the lights and the British. I would expect you to know better, you living there and all. Sarah Palin has the right story. According to Sarah, Paul Revere rode through town, "Ringing them bells and waving those lanterns warning the British that they weren't going to be taking our guns away." I wish you would get it right.

[No Elephants]

4. Shhhh. I'll tell you a little secret.

But first, a factoid.

A fantastic re-enactor plays Paul Revere at the Revere House. It does not seem to be just a job for him. He seems entirely "into it."

Speaking as Paul Revere, he "explained" "I would never have said, "The British are coming."

He went on to point out that, in Massachusetts, just before the Revolution began, "We were all British. I considered myself British."

IIRC, after that, he said that, while his recollection of his exact words that night is no longer perfect, he may have said something like, "The Redcoats are coming."

In fairness to Paul, it was a high tension situation that night. Tough to remember.

Now, "Paul" is speculating, I assume, since no one recorded what Revere said that night and his own memory of his exact words has faded. (Gee, youdda thunk someone would have whipped out the a camcorder, wouldn't ya No sense of history, those people in 1775!)

But, the re-enactor has done a lot of research on every little detail and given everything a lot of thought. What he said made sense to me.

Now the secret, just between you and me (and anyone who accesses wikipedia):

The Ride

On the evening of April 18, 1775, Paul Revere and William Dawes were dispatched by Joseph Warren to warn the countryside that the British were coming. Prescott was in Lexington at the time to visit with his fiancee Lydia Mulliken.<6> He was also there to report on Concord’s readiness, its status in hiding supplies and munitions from the British, and its success in moving cannon to Groton lest it fall into British hands.<7> The British wanted the military stores at Concord and had hoped to capture Samuel Adams and John Hancock in the process.

<snip>

Dawes also escaped from his pursuers, but it was after a close chase, a frantic ruse on his part, and a little bit of luck. Once he was safe, he considered circling around the patrol and racing on to Concord much as Prescott had, but he heard the Concord town house bell and knew Prescott had made it there, and so he continued on his special mission, for he was only assigned to accompany Revere to Concord.<9> Prescott, meanwhile, continued west to warn Acton, Massachusetts while his brother Abel Prescott rode south to warn Sudbury and Framingham. By this time, countless riders were also dispatched from other towns to spread the warning—while bells and cannon were rung or fired to punctuate the danger at hand.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Prescott

Remember, at the point that Sarah made her comments, she was touring America in her bus. She spoke after just having taken a tour of Revere's house and also of Lexington and Concord, where there is also a re-enactment, and probably other historic sites in Massachusetts. The info she learned was fresh in her mind.

Maybe she did not say what she said in a very artful or scholarly way, but she was not far off base on the facts, either (aside from the facts that no one knows what any of the players actually yelled out that night).

Would I have pointed this out online while Palin was looking as though she might run for something after she finished her bus tour? Hmmm. I don't recall ever having posted this stuff before today. Maybe the subject never came up at DU at the time that she made those remarks?

;-)

P.S. What if the "Redcoat NSA" had access to Revere's metadata?

http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-06-12/what-if-the-redcoat-nsa-had-access-to-paul-reveres-metadata

BTW, Joseph Warren was a doctor (very nasty business back then) and I have seen his reenactor at the Revere House as well. Massachusetts General Hospital has a Warren Building. I don't know if his descendants had anything to do with funding it, or if the hospital just named the building after this historic surgeon.

While practicing medicine and surgery in Boston, he joined the Masonic Lodge of St. Andrew and eventually was appointed as a Grand Master.<[2> He also became involved in politics, associating with John Hancock, Samuel Adams, and other radical leaders of the broad movement labeled Sons of Liberty. Warren conducted an autopsy on the body of young Christopher Seider in February 1770, and was a member of the Boston committee that assembled a report on the following month's Boston Massacre. Earlier, in 1768, Royal officials tried to place his publishers Edes and Gill on trial for an incendiary newspaper essay Warren wrote under the pseudonym A True Patriot, but no local jury would indict them.<3>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Warren

The above quote from his wiki is food for thought about what the Framers thought of anti-government radicals and also what their idea of a jury system and jury nullification would have been.

The whole idea of a jury of one's peers in England was that jurors, being in the neighborhood and knowing the suspect personally--and maybe having heard gossip--were in the best position to decide guilt or innocence. The Framers would never have understood today's jury instruction and sequestion. But, don't hold your breath waiting for the great originalist on the SCOTUS to strike down any of those modern precedents relating to juries. He's very selective about which "intent of the Framers" he upholds and which he strikes down.

The bit about Masons is interesting, too.

[Enthusiast]

5. No Elephants, Sarah Palin was WAY the fuck off on her facts.

The CENTRAL facts.

She understood that Paul Revere was warning the British, not the colonists. She understood that the colonists were warning the British that we were going to stand up to them. You know, like the Tea Party of today stands up to Obama. You don't see this?